Question of the Day: Do We Need Fewer Armed Police?

1. I believe we have enough.

   • I believe we have enough too many.

     Fixed that for you.

2. How else are we going to employ all those soldiers coming home from war?

3. I think we have too many agencies. I don’t know how many actual LEO’s this list of agencies contains.

   In the private world, they would look to consolidate similar enforcement requirements.

   Expanding further on that – in an ideal world – the Military Law Enforcement would be one department with different divisions. The FBI type of LEO’s (DEA, BATFE (our favorite), ICE, IRS, etc…) would fall under DHS as a division. But then again, being a director of one of those organizations is a powerful and heady experience – nobody wants to relinquish the power they have attained. In the end, Follow The Money!!!

   But this really speaks more about bloatacracy in Government than it does the “police state”. The Feds have a complete inability to really work well in each others’ sandbox. Oh sure, smaller units in some sort of “joint” venture may be successful – but I think the overhead of running this many agencies is more the problem than the “quantity” of LEO’s.

   Then again, I don’t know what that number is in relation to the population.

4. Do we have too many cops? Yes. Good luck getting rid of them though. A much larger problem is that we have nowhere near high enough training standards, regardless of department or duty.

   So long as we maintain a judicial system that prevents gross violations of the Constitution, it’s less of an issue. That, however, is becoming an increasing issue to contend with.

   Fortunately, technology is beginning to play a very large role in preventing abuses of power, and that trend may well continue to limit said abuses more and more effectively. Providing, of course, the ability to record the cops is protected.

5. Don’t forget some universities are getting their own SWAT teams as well:
   http://www.theagitator.com/2012/02/02/congratulations-university-of-north-carolina-charlotte/

6. Yes, yes , and yes.What must be remembered about most government agencies is that only a fraction of the manpower is actually out kicking doors and serving warrants. A majority of people in those departments are strapping on their Glock 22’s and traversing the deadly corridors of the regional Headquarters’ copy room.

   A solution to this problem would be to apply the same “need based” criterion to law enforcement the way some New Jersey issues concealed weapon permits;

   “So the last warrant you served was over ten years ago. Can you fit into your beat uniform? No? Please turn in your Glock and magazines at the desk, Mr. Department Desk Jockey”

   ” Mr Marshall, so your job detail is to guard Cosa Nostra court witnesses from attack? Here’s your P90 and extra mag.”

   Before someone gets their feewings hurt , I served in the military in a non-combat AFSC (Army guys call it MOS). Had the MAJCOM bosses decided my non-combat job title did not merit a 9mm issue pistol in the desert I wouldn’t feel the least bit put out, as in the event the desk commandos in my career field are the ones leading a combat charge it means the front line guys were gone and the base was history anyway.

7. I was raised in New York City, where cops walked a beat, knew everybody in the neighborhood and everybody knew them. Now they cower in their cruisers, happy in their anonymity and armed to the teeth. Let them keep their armament, but get them out of their damn cars and into the places where they might actually do some good.

   • +1. Cops complain that they can’t be social workers, but that’s pretty much what they used to be. If Danny O’Leary was getting too far into the whiskey, you could put a stop to the trouble before he started beating his wife. I understand that it wasn’t Mayberry, but now the cops are more like an occupying army, especially in “bad” (non-white) neighborhoods. Nobody trusts the cops. Nobody likes the cops. I tell my kids not to talk to the cops if they can help it, and I’m pretty much an upstanding citizen. As individuals, the couple of cops I’ve known are totally decent people, but on the street, forget it. It’s all us-and-them now. Protect and serve? Ha.

8. Hot blonde cops are ok as long as they keep their unproven suspicions, snarky comments, and opinions to themselves.
   I bet she plays good cop bad cop better than anyone.

9. Most of the women police I’ve observed look and act like men. I’ve come to the conclusion that most police forces are affirmative action institutions first, and police agencies last.

   With open carry they could do away with the police, since I could carry a handgun and rifle with me. But don’t get rid of the firemen. I can’t very well carry a fire hose.

   • I guess cops don’t do anything but carry a gun and shoot people? What about the hundreds of calls a night to keep people from fighting or hurting each other? What about pulling accident victims out of cars? What about getting people out of burning structures because the fire department takes 3 extra minutes to get there? What about running to the sound of gunfire instead of running away?

     I guess cops just hide in the cruisers waiting to shoot someone if I follow your logic.

     • Yes. Cops spend a lot of time breaking up fights with low lifes. But who cares? Let the losers beat each other up. If they shoot each other, I frankly don’t care.

       The other stuff is probably a benefit. But questionable women are not the ones that do it best. Nor do cops need a large military style arsenal in order to complete the task of saving folks from burning structures. I exaggerate some, but not much.

       • Well, the problem with what you propose happen is the shots those people are firing at each other tend to fly into homes and hit other people. I agree that law enforcement has gone off the deep end, but to totally dissolve it and let people eat each other is not the answer.

       • You clearly have no idea what law enforcement does.

10. I wonder if the Library of Congress cops have a SWAT team, nebpver know when you might have some hostile kids talking loudly in the stacks.

11. The politicians need to have fewer laws with less government and enforce the remainder. As of now we have many laws with uneven enforcement. I think too many dumb victimless crime laws resulting in non-violent offenders crowding the prisons and violent offenders being shown the revolving door.

12. Amazing isn’t it — the post office has its armed force.

    I less concerned that we have so many agencies versus so many are redendent and they are poorly coordinated so their is a lot of waste and turf wars. Govt in general is rarely if ever efficient — if they where more efficient and effective, we would need fewer. The issue, is that in many cases, some politician or dept has their hand in the till, and so they will not give back or reduce.

    That said, we have a large country with lot of land mass and there are plenty of illegal activity that happens so you do need a force of sufficient size. Many of these groups do have a focused mission and the local PD cannot be everywhere and then you have federal versus state versus local juristiction which make things even more messy.

    In the end, it is a lack of coordination, cooperation and efficiency that worries more than all these agencies.

13. The list is out of date. The Library of Congress PD and Supreme Court PD were merged into the US Capitol PD several years ago.

    A lot of the list of Federal “Police ” agencies is a matter of semantics and fine print. A lot of those listed are essentially security forces at their own buildings. Lots more are essentially forensic accountants dealing with finiancil waste and abuse dealing w/ their respective Gov’t entity. Neither catagory has much effect or interaction on general public.

    • Except for the fact that we pay for it.

14. I don’t know if we have too many cops, but I sure think that we have too many agencies, with too many beaurocracies, too many different sets of rules, different levels of training, different agendas. And there is obviously to me too much overlap, especially in customs and immigration, and the department of the interior.

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